Panasonic's 2nd generation OLED TV is the EZ1000

Panasonic has at CES 2017 unveiled a new OLED TV called EZ1000. The company has collaborated with Hollywood to get the most out of the new display technology.

Panasonic EZ1000 OLED

Panasonic launched its first OLED TV, CZ950, in 2015, and will in a few months from now launch a second-generation EZ1000 with a flat design.

Panasonic has collaborated with colorists from Hollywood in fine-tuning the TV, and has implemented what it is calling professional-grade color processing.

At the presentation Panasonic compared the TV to a so-called reference monitor – a monitor used by Hollywood movie studios to grade movies on – to demonstrate how accurate the colors are, and how much it has improved reproduction of shadow details.

As you may know, Panasonic and others are sourcing OLED panels from LG.Display but the Japanese company claims that by drawing on its experience from plasma technology, another self-illuminating display technology, it can further optimize OLED performance.

New picture processor

In EZ1000 Panasonic is also introducing a new HCX2 picture processor, which has been improved over last year’s HCX processor.

HCX2 can deliver even more accurate colors; so accurate that Panasonic is more or less promising perfect color reproduction at very close to deltaE 0. This is achieved by utilizing a ”3D look-up table” that processing colors internally before outputting it to the panel.

- ”Also the OLED TV features Imaging Science Foundation (isf) calibration settings and compatibility with the Portrait Displays CalMAN calibration system. These features provide more proof for consumers, too, of the EZ1000’s truly unique level of picture accuracy,” said Panasonic.

The TV has been certified by THX and Panasonic is working with the UHD Alliance to have it ”UHD Premium” certified. It has not yet received the certification but Panasonic is confident that it will pass before the TV is released this summer. Panasonic adds that the TV has a peak brightness level of 800 nits and that the color space is close to 100% DCI-P3, says LG. A new filter will maintain pure black levels even in very bright environments.

More HDR formats

Panasonic is not backing the Dolby Vision format. EZ1000 instead supports the open HDR10 formats and the new HLG format, developed by the broadcast industry.

Panasonic says that the TV, with its eminent picture characteristics, was "made for HDR". Because OLED has pixel level control from true black to bright white it can reproduce HDR pictures with higher accuracy.

Powerful sound

Panasonic has developed a completely new 80 Watt ”dynamic blade speaker” audio system for EZ1000. It has been developed and optimized in collaboration with Technics.

Despite the compact design, Panasonic has been able to fit 8 woofers 4 squawkers and 2 tweeters inside.

Lastly, the company says that EZ1000 is equipped with ”My Home Screen 2.0”, which traditionally has referred to Firefox OS. As you may know, Mozilla is no longer developing Firefox OS and it has been speculated that Panasonic would partner with Google to implement Android TV. However, that it not happening – at least not now.

The platform will support 4K HDR streaming via Netflix, Amazon and YouTube.

Panasonic’s 65-inch EZ1000 OLED will be avialable on the market in June 2017. Pricing details were not announced.